LONDON, 13 Feb. (PA Media/dpa/EP) –
The independent report commissioned by UEFA to shed light on the incidents surrounding before and after the 2021-2022 Champions League final between Real Madrid and Liverpool at the Stade Saint-Dennis in Paris pointed to the continental body as ” the main culprit.”
The final of the maximum continental competition on May 28 was marked by serious problems around the Parisian stadium, with thousands of fans of the English team unable to enter after organized gangs tried to steal their tickets and also being subjected to the police action with tear gas. All this caused the start of the meeting to be delayed half an hour.
Both UEFA and the city authorities were highly criticized for everything that happened and for the lack of security for the fans also after the match, for which the entity chaired by Aleksander Ceferin commissioned a team led by the Portuguese Tiago Brandao Rodrigues to investigate the facts.
This Tuesday, this panel published the 220-page report, where UEFA was blamed and Liverpool fans were completely exonerated, whom the body came to blame for arriving late at the stadium, although it was leaked hours before, which that motivated the anger of the English team.
“The panel is left with a feeling of real concern for the lack of vision of what happened on May 28 and for not recognizing the role of the authorities,” the document states, which regrets that the “network” fans were blamed. “without any adequate evidentiary basis”.
For the panel, it was “remarkable” that there was no loss of life to be mourned even though a near “mass death catastrophe” could have happened. “The panel has concluded that UEFA, as the owner of the event, bears primary responsibility for the failures that led to near disaster,” the report said, believing that “senior officials” at the body allowed this to happen, “despite that the shortcomings of their model were widely known at the senior management level, as was acknowledged before the panel”.
The UEFA General Secretary, Theodore Theodoridis, thanked the panel for “this work” and, “on behalf” of the organization, sincerely apologized once again to all those who were affected by the events that took place in what should have been been a celebration at the high point of the club season”.
“In particular, I would like to apologize to Liverpool fans for the experiences many of them had while attending the match and for the messages released before and during the match which had the effect of unfairly blaming them for the situation that led to the delay of the match. kick-off,” he said in a statement on the UEFA website, which “will separately announce a special refund plan for fans.”
The executive assured that they are committed “to learning” from what happened and that they “will cooperate closely with the groups of fans, the finalist clubs, the host federations and the local authorities in order to offer exceptional finals in which everyone can enjoy the game in a safe and welcoming environment”.